Professor of Labor Studies Penny Lewis is union through and through. Lewis is one of the original full-time faculty members of the School of Labor and Urban Studies, and worked at its predecessor, the Joseph S. Murphy Institute, beginning in 2009. Before that, she worked for SEIU 1199, PSC-CUNY, and the National Lawyers Guild, and was a member of IATSE 770 and UAW 2320. At present, she serves as Vice President for Senior Colleges on the Executive Council of the PSC-CUNY union.
Lewis grew up in an affordable Mitchell-Lama development in Manhattan, where her very civically active parents still live. She received a B.A. in Semiotics at Brown University, followed by graduate study in Sociology at CUNY’s Graduate Center, earning her Ph.D. in 2009. Her books include A People’s Guide to New York City and The City Is the Factory.
This semester, Lewis is teaching a Capstone class. Her other courses include Perspectives on the Labor Movement; Power and Strategy; Urban Social Movements, and Issues in Organizing. She lives with her husband and two teenage daughters in Brooklyn.
Asked about hobbies, she says, “I do union.” She likes reading, too.
Why Labor Studies?
I think I come to labor in two ways at least. Academically, it’s out of an interest in class and power. I think in order to understand how class works in any context, labor is going to be a big part of it. It’s the institutionalized expression of class power in the United States.
But then I also came out of being a unionized worker and working for labor unions before coming to what was then the Murphy Institute. So I kind of came out of the labor movement.
I like the interdisciplinarity of Labor Studies and I like its commitment to the real world.
What made you a professor?
When I applied, it felt like they were looking for people who had experience within the CUNY system. I taught at BMCC while I was writing my dissertation for six years. I think they were happy that I had that labor experience, and then an academic area that was connected to the field. So I checked all those boxes.
I’m not 100% sure I’d be an academic if I wasn’t here. Because it’s just the perfect place.
What do you find special about SLU?
What makes SLU so special is that we are utterly grounded in the actual labor movement, the actual politics of the city and the state and the university. No ivory tower. I would never want to work in an ivory tower.
I also love my colleagues. I feel really lucky, having colleagues who are so mission-aligned, and who really prioritize our students, prioritize our collective endeavors. There’s not a lot of ego or competition.
And in the institution as a whole, we have incredible staff, we have people who are so committed to making this place work. I’ve always felt like it’s very warm and congenial. At the end of the day, it means that our students really get tremendous support.
What do you find special about SLU students?
We have the greatest students in New York City. Our students literally run the city and also are trying to make it better. So who else would you want to spend time with, and learn with and learn from and teach?
People bring amazing life experience. It’s always just a very rich conversation.
What do you want students to get out of your classes?
I want them to maintain curiosity and critical thinking. I want them to learn how to read difficult texts and engage with ideas that challenge them. I am very interested in contrarian positions: I want people to think critically and make up their own minds about the questions they’re bringing to the classes. And I care a lot about good writing, ultimately, too.
Books I recommend:
- The Door, by Magda Szabo
- Mother Mary Comes to Me, by Arundhati Roy
- Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s Open AI, by Karen Hao